


A Gut Feeling

by orphan_account



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Community: bloodyvalentine, Food Poisoning, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Only a little bit of comfort though, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance, Vomiting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-05
Updated: 2014-03-05
Packaged: 2018-01-14 15:07:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1270963
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Karkat lay in Dirk’s bed, staring straight at the ceiling, sleepless. He was trying his hardest to not focus on his queasy stomach.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Gut Feeling

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the prompt: "Waking up sick in the middle of the night, and throwing up in bed" from bloodyvalentine.dreamwidth.org.

Karkat lay in Dirk’s bed, staring straight up, sleepless and trying his hardest to not focus on his queasy stomach. He could barely make out the cracks in the ceiling in the very dim light trickling in through the window, and he had long ago given up on trying to see shapes or other wiggler bullshit in said lines. His stomach gurgled uncomfortably. Why the fuck had he let the Striders talk him into eating that fluorescent orange monstrosity? Karkat glanced to the offender oh-so-innocently sleeping beside to him, hogging the good side of the bed and forcing the troll to be stuck between him and the wall.

Fuck _cheese_. It was some freakish accident that many humans had a genetic mutation allowing them to process the lactation products of animals. Amongst trolls, Equius was the only one who Karkat had ever known would consume something made out of milk. Just the thought of it made Karkat gag. How had he stomached that entire bowl?

Then again, maybe it wasn't the milk, but some allergic reaction to whatever godawful ingredients had gone into their painstakingly recreated, dangerously bright-colored _Kraft Macaroni and Cheese: The Cheesiest._ He could practically taste it in his mouth again, which didn’t help his stomach settled won in the least.

The last option was equally unpalatable: He might have picked up some terrible virus from their new planet. Apparently pathogens were a multi-universal constant, and trolls and humans were both biologically similar enough to the new species that it wasn't unthinkable.

Whatever it was, Karkat wasn't going to let it get the better of him. A little nausea was nothing he couldn't handle; he just had to fucking wait it out and get some sleep.

Sighing - loudly at first, then quietly half a second later when he remembered that, _you moron, Dirk’s still sleeping_ \- Karkat closed his eyes. The ugly patterns on the ceiling weren't helping him drift off anyway. This place was kind of a dump, compared with what most of the rest of the kids had built. He didn't fully understand why Dirk had insisted on building such a careful recreation of his childhood hive to live in when they could create literally anything they wanted, but nostalgia was a powerful force. Karkat still teared up at The Notebook, so he wasn't in any position to harass anyone else about being sentimental, as Dirk had so kindly reminded him a few days ago.

For a moirail, Dirk could be an obnoxious piece of shit, but only because the two of them had so much in common. Honestly, that’s what made him such a good pale partner in the first place. The human understood Karkat in ways no one else really got, and had uncanny knack for calming him the hell down.

From his conversations with the first four kids way back then, Karkat had assumed all humans would be terrible moirails. Soon after he’d met Dirk, his pale feelings developed strong and fast. The human was just so pitiable behind all his awkward faux-coolness.

At some point, Karkat must have drifted off, since he was now being jerked awake by an acute pain in his gut. His stomach roiled horribly and he winced in pain, clawing to get the blankets off of him. He had to get to the bathroom _right the fuck now_.

Before he could do more than sit up, sheets still tangled around his legs and waist, Karkat’s stomach rebelled. He retched, bile shooting up his throat, and he knew it was unavoidable a second before the first splash of puke splattered into his lap. _Onto Dirk’s fucking sheets._

Karkat’s entire torso felt like it was trying to eject itself through his throat, and he painfully heaved again, mind screaming at his idiocy for eating that sludge, for not getting up sooner, for thinking he’d be ok, for fucking everything because Dirk was definitely stirring now and there was no fucking way out of this. Dirk was definitely waking up as Karkat was throwing up all over his now-sure-to-be-ex-moirail’s bed.

“What the fuck?” Yup, Dirk was awake. “Holy shit, are you okay? I mean obviously you aren’t okay, fuck...”

Karkat gave a final, pathetic retch, and spit out the last, disgusting dregs as Dirk flicked on the lamp. He squeezed his eyes shut from the sudden burn. The tears welling in the corners of his eyes were absolutely from the soft glow of the lamp and not the complete and utter _revoltingness of every millimeter of his puke-covered body_.

“Karkat?” Dirk asked quietly.

Slowly, the troll opened his eyes again, only to have his now-empty stomach churn again at the sight of the ruined bedding, hideously saturated by the violently orange, partially digested mess. It was wet and warm and _vile and on him and on Dirk’s stuff FUCK_.

There went any chance he had ever had of keeping Dirk as a moirail. Dirk’s hand was on his shoulder now, presumably shaking him to get the fuck out, to take this whole mess with him and never show his vile, wet-with-puke-and-tears face here ever again.

Fifteen minutes later, Karkat was not, in fact, slogging his way back to his own respite block covered in vomit, but sitting naked on the floor of Dirk’s tub. Lukewarm water poured out of the showerhead and cascaded down his body. Despite having washed away pretty much all of the unseemly fluids by now, it hadn’t yet started to make Karkat feel anything less than repulsive.

Karkat heard footsteps and glanced up. Dirk returned to the bathroom and went to the sink, washing his hands for longer than was probably necessary. When he finished, the human stood a few paces away, still near the doorway but close enough to lean on it, like he wasn’t sure whether to address Karkat or whether to leave again. His hands were shoved in his pockets and he was staring at a spot on the wall a good foot above where Karkat was curled up. Only the gentle hiss of the shower kept away silence for several long moments, during which Karkat’s think pan ran through all the horrible things that Dirk must be thinking, before his moirail finally spoke up.

“I know it’s overdue enough that my statement might seem disingenuous, so sorry in advance for that, but I seriously do apologize for bullying you into eating what whole bowl of Kraft. You’re amusing as hell to piss off sometimes, but I seriously feel like shit seein’ you actually miserable. So, I’m sorry.”


End file.
